This
website includes the documents and the witnesses about
the Orthodox Church of Estonia for the purpose of recording
the whole topic to the memory of History. Still nowadays,
there are people living in Russia and in Estonia who
have closely or remotely been the actors or victims
of a tragic destiny. We keep all the thoughts of quarrel
and vain suspicions far from us. If we make place to
certain memories, it is only because we hope to create
such new conditions that the past would never be repeated
and the future would bring about a reconciliation with
all the Orthodox population in this country. It seems
to me that it is high time for us to force ourselves
just there where we are to stop all "colonialist-like
attitudes that have nothing to do with the ecclesiology
and canonical tradition of the Orthodox Church"
(1).

The
Communist occupation has left in Estonia bills that
have not yet been settled between the Russian Orthodox
Church and ours. They simply have been put aside. It
continuously engenders and maintains hatred and separation.
All quarrel about this past crime that endures without
name and face must finally be finished even if there
is a risk to consider as an almost natural death approaching
progressively, as the time passes by (2).

We
do not want this silence that asphyxiates, suffocates,
and more than anything else serves only to cover up
an imposture. We do not want more legal proceedings.
The first task of memory is to make an appeal - an appeal
to mutual awakening to repent; an appeal to the examination
of consciousness about the past and in facing the future.

The
Orthodox Church of Estonia has had a most devilish experience
possible in human condition. However, what strikes,
is its measure facing the unmeasurable criminal act
that has so deeply bruised the Church. For about half
a century all the most elementary human rights have
been violated daily in this country and the highest
ecclesiastical authorities, clergymen and laics, whether
they liked it or not, have also contributed to maintain
the despair. The kernel of our Church today, especially
when nobody could foresee the renewal, is just this
small remnant that is so emphatically mentioned in the
Holy Scripture. The small remnant as a permanent witness
of Christs Resurrection, the only one capable
of exorcizing its roots from nihilism that parasites
our society, the derivative of indifference, of the
cynism, of the hatred, in one word, the lack of hope.
The small remnant so rich in promises for some people
and so disturbing for the others Only he will
finally be able to sublimate authentically the death-resurrection
of the disaster that reigned over us during the soviet
period (3).

The
Orthodox Church always requires from us a totally different
way of being, founded on an ethos animated by the secret
joy of Resurrection. Any other consideration, whether
nostalgic, romantic or nationalistic, does not serve
neither Church nor God's people but only political objectives
and interests.
+ STEPHANOS, Metropolitan of Tallinn and all Estonia

N
O T E S

(1)
Archbishop Nathanael of Roumanian archdiocese of Orthodox
Church in America, in S.O.P. No 255/ Paris  February
2001, p. 7.

(2) The autonomy of the Orthodox Church of Estonia,
accorded in 1923 by the Oecumenical Patriarch Meletios,
was abolished in March, 9, 1945 by force, unilaterally
without respecting the canonical order and without informing
the Oecumenical Patriarch about it nor waiting for his
consentment (indicatively and regardless of the oppression,
only 21 parishes out of 119 existing, or 17% of the
total at that time, asked to be submitted to the obedience
of the Patriarchate of Moscow). It was replaced by an
ecclesiastical entity named Estonian Diocese. From this
moment on began an intense russification. At the end
of 1955, only 45% of priests were of Estonian descent;
in 1990, only 12% of clergy were Estonian.

In
1951, the Diocese was reconverted into the Vicarage
of the Diocese of Leningrad. Other catastrophes followed
very soon. All the church treasures were quickly nationalized.
By 1950-51 the taxes and the charges of the parishes
had gone up to the point that one church after another
was forced to be closed. Thus between 1946 and 1953
20 churches were closed; between 1954 and 1970, 29 churches,
between 1971 and 1988, 12 churches.

It
should be remembered that 23 priests and almost 8 000
faithful followed Metropolitan Alexander in his exile,
another 45 priests as well as the whole élite
of the nation were deported or assassinated; all in
all, 25% of the population were eradicated and replaced
by people transplanted from Russia. Between 1945 and
1955, further 24 priests and 2 laics of the administration
of diocese counsel were arrested; they disappeared.
How many people followed their destiny! Another example
to illustrate these events: in 1947 there were 13 clergymen
known to be the members of the KGB and 30 were known
as informants.

Metropolitan
Alexander while in exile in Stockholm asserts in one
of his letters in April 27, 1950 that it is impossible
to receive any information or have any contact with
Estonia because of the existing censorship and because
all his friends and relatives were systematically arrested.

Finally,
under the rule of Stalin, in addition to one book containing
the chants of vigil, the only tolerated religious publication
was the annual liturgical calendar.

Such
was, in brief, the endless calvary of the Orthodox Church
of Estonia under the Soviet rule, of which fore-running
signs remount to the assassination of the very first
Estonian bishop Platon by the soldiers of the Red Army
in 1919.

(3)
In 1940 there were 242 000 orthodox, or 20% of population,
served by 3 bishops, 156 priests, of which 9 were vicar
generals, 155 parishes (of which 126 were of Estonian
origin and 29 of Russian origin), one Seminary, one
chair of Theology in the University of Tartu, two monasteries,
many schools and several other institutions. All the
liturgical offices were translated into Estonian. Many
liturgical hymns were composed by Estonian authors,
who drew their inspiration from popular choral culture.
The Youth Movement was very dynamic and covered the
whole country. Several publications  of which
the only survivor today is Usk ja Elu, because it was
published in exile without interruption  saw daylight
almost everywhere. It is obvious that in Estonia the
Orthodox Church had a total success in its religious
and cultural integration in spite of the justified influence
of the Lutheran Church.

As
far as the small remnant is concerned, lets look
at the evidence. We know that in Church it is not an
argument to speak about a majority. It is evident that
there are more orthodox of Russian origin today than
autochtons in Church because of the relocation of the
people under communist rule and because of the Stalins
russification policy  using Church as a mediator.
On the contrary to the affirmation of the Patriarchate
of Moscow that has counted in two years instead of 60
000 faithful 200 000, according to the statistics of
the Ministry of Internal Affairs (in year 2000) there
are 45 000 members in the Russian Orthodox Church and
15 000 in the Orthodox Church of Estonia, making altogether
4.5% Orthodox of the whole population, whereas the Lutheran
Church is represented by almost 12.5% and all the other
Christian denominations 1%. Thus we can observe a certain
reserve in this domain. The problem is even more complex
because during the Soviet period there were practically
no certifications of baptism nor marriage delivered.
Even nowadays it would be preferable to consider as
a basis the number of communicants in a liturgy; this
fact shows also how complicated are the matters of statistics.

Another
significant notice is that following the agreement of
Zurich in April 22, 1996, it is known that the number
of votes in favour of the Orthodox Church of Estonia
was about 7000. At the same time, the Information Bulletin
of the Department of External Church Relations of the
Moscow Patriarchate (No. 4/ 96, page 32) counts 10,785
votes in favour of the Russian Orthodox Church, including
1,117 in the capital, Tallinn. The handling of figures
practiced by certain pro-Moscow mass media gives of
course a completely erroneous image of the local reality.
The current count of the Ministry of Interiour Affairs
of Estonia seems in fact the most credible.

Thus
in the present case the argument of the greatest number
or that of the cultural heritage or ethnophilism (considered
by the way as a heresy by the Counsil of Constantinople
in 1872) cannot convince the Church. It is impossible
to bargain over the ecclesiastical affairs. The only
argument that counts is that there has to be an independent
Church in an independent State, recognized by International
Community.

Next
example: as the frontiers of Albania were fixed by the
Treaty of Lausanne in 1923, the most of the southern
parishes were originally Greek and the Episcopacy of
Greece wanted them to be subjected. After 1937, when
the Orthodox Church of Albania was proclaimed autocephalous,
the Church of Greece, though reluctantly, finally resigned
to the reality. The local Church in Albania does not
serve only the local national people but each Christian
orthodox (Albanian, Greek, Serbian, Roumanian...). Let
us recall that in November 1967 the Communist Party
annulled all the decrees concerning the relationship
between state and Church and that in December 1976 the
Constitution of Albanian Socialist Popular Democracy
cancelled all religious practices. The results are well
known: destined to long-lasting silence, regardless
of the most pessimistic predictions the Orthodox Church
of Albania was not completely eradicated, but experienced
a revival in August 1991 when the first post-Communist
clergical-laic assembly was convoked.

What
is true for Albania is also valid for Estonia, the two
countries have beaten quite similar tracks. The Orthodox
Church of Estonia was not irreparably broken by the
Communist ideology. She survived in the exile. She survived
also in the Soviet Estonia. The demand for an autonomy
for clergy and faithful shows clearly that they refuse
absolutely to an everlasting submissiveness to the Patriarchate
of Moscow. The Tomos of reactivation in 1996 avoided
that the local Orthodoxy would split up into several
different denominations. Its great merit was to safeguard
the sole necessary and to offer to the Russian Orthodox
Church a possibility to retain, by ecclesiastical economy
and because of respecting the people, her own jurisdiction
on the Estonian soil (convention of Zurich in 1996 )
.